Future In My Hands
by AranthianPrincess
Summary: Three years ago nine humans developed territories and began to aid Spirit World in the battle against demon invasion. They lost much, including the last three years of their lives. However, one human refuses to give up her life and memories so easily.
1. Prologue

It seems when I first put this chapter up, I forgot to mention some things. My deepest apologies. *bows* Anyway, yes this is a Yu Yu fan-fic, but with a bit of a twist. There is a lot of information in the prologue for a reason, which is this is a sequel to a fan-fic and RP written by a friend of mine, which she gave me permission to write. Well, it's actually more based on what might have happened if the ending we expect for the RP is the one we get. That's what the prologue is all about. It's actually the prompt from my character's point of view, hence the italics. And, yes, I know the names of most of the characters (all the characters except the canon ones, in fact) are not Japanese, but that is because they are actually American. This was explained in the first fan-fic, but I'll talk about it in this one later. Anyway, sorry for the confusion at first and thank you to the reviewers who brought all this to my attention.

**Prologue**

"_I can make you forget."_

_Several heads shot up, all eyes on the toddler standing before them. The idea that this was the ruler of the Spirit World still baffled at least one of their number, but his words were what she focused on at the moment. Koenma watched them all quietly, judging the expressions on the humans' faces, one in particular standing out among the rest. Most of them looked resigned, willingly, or eager to take him up on his offer, but not Katrina._

_The young woman stared at him in shock and what appeared to be abject horror. Yes, terrible things had happened since developing their territories, especially within the past few months, but she did not want to give up her memories of these events no matter how bad they were. Yes, some of her friends had died in the course of their missions and she was sure more terrible things would happen in the future, but running away never solved anything._

_She thought back to the very day she had developed her powers, not even realizing any difference at first. It was only until she had returned to school for her senior year and they were all sitting together in the main hall as usual. Thinking back, Katrina thought her friends had been acting strange until she had done the unexpected. She had solved an overly-complicated Calculus problem... in her head. No one had been expecting, least of all her. That day everything changed._

_Katrina remembered meeting Yusuke, Hiei, Kurama, and Kuwabara for the first time. She remembered the training, difficult though it had been, but infinitely helpful in the end. The young woman even remembered the day her oldest friend turned into an unemotional killing machine. That had been terrifying, but everything had worked out. They stopped the portal from opening and the bad guys were killed._

_Then she remembered college and the trip she had gone on to participate in a dig in Egypt. They all thought their powers had been brought under control and they were safe. Well, they had been terribly wrong. Katrina remembered the odd reactions she was getting from her friend and partner, Jacen, and the ensuing flight for home. Her territory had exploded out of control, scaring her into returning home in the hopes one of her friends knew something more, but it didn't work out that way. And Jacen! He had helped her without a second thought. God! She definitely did not want to forget him!_

_The death of one of their own on the news. Katrina hadn't even heard about it from that heartless regurgitator of horrible information, but from a friend weeks after it had happened. His powers had exploded out of his control, literally. In an instant Jeff had been no more, destroyed by the very abilities he had thought under his own and had used in his and his friends' defense countless times. That wasn't even the worst of it. The demons just couldn't leave them alone and began to possess another friend, one she barely knew._

_This they could have handled, but something had gone horribly wrong. Katrina glanced over at Torre, who seemed to be the most eager of all of them to have his memories erased of these horrible events. Of course he would. He had killed his best friend, Katie, while under the possession of his demonic ancestor. Ironically, she had died in an explosion as well. The young woman spared a brief moment to wonder if perhaps they were all destined to brilliant, violent ends by flame like her band teacher had once told them he wished for._

_Yes, terrible things had happened and Katrina had grieved for her fallen friends, but she did not want to forget all this had happened. Good things had come out of these experiences and, though they all struggled during the past ordeal, she believed their friendship was stronger than it ever had been before and she didn't want to lose that. She didn't want to give up all that she had gained and return to a time when life had been easier. Many people often expressed wishes to return to easier times, including Katrina herself, but when the time came and the proposition offered she found herself rejecting it with every fiber of her being._

_You couldn't just erase three years of a person's life and expect them to be okay with it. The experiences they had gained over the course of those years makes them who they are and would be lost along with their current selves. Katrina did not want to have to relive several years of trials and tribulations she had already triumphed over. And, most of all, she did not want to forget the adventures she had gone on. They defined her now and she would not lose them._

_Katrina's attention returned to the present. Koenma had been speaking, explaining the repercussions of forgetting, but she hadn't listened. It didn't matter anyway. She already knew what would happen, having figured it out before Koenma began to explain. Then the toddler King of the Spirit World turned to her, a stern look in his eyes. Somehow, he knew what she was thinking and was going to address her concerns._

"_Make no mistake," he said, staring right at the brunette. "You have no choice in the matter. I merely thought I should warn you."_

_Suddenly, Katrina was standing in the hallway of her high school in front of her open locker. She gathered several books and folders, shoving them in the Asian-style messenger bag she used to lug schoolwork back and forth. She waved goodbye to Molly and Kaitlyn as they parted ways for the summer, walking toward opposite ends of the hall. Katrina swung her bag over one shoulder and went to meet her mother outside. As she crossed the street between the building and the parking lot next to the radio tower something told her to glance back._

_Looking up Katrina could just barely make out five figures standing on the roof. One of them gave her a small wave, which she returned, her forehead wrinkled in concentration as she tried to place them. They seemed familiar to her somehow, but she couldn't remember who they were. Shrugging, the young woman jogged over to the large, blue truck and hopped into the front seat._

_Little did she know that the rest of her friends had also seen the mysterious figures. In the back of her mind she knew she had forgotten something important, but she decided not to dwell on it. All of her friends had similar feelings. Each of them felt an emptiness they couldn't explain and remembered the ghost of a past that seemed more like a dream than a past reality. They all knew these phantom-like memories had really happened, but, through some unspoken agreement, no one ever mentioned anything about those lost years._


	2. Chapter 1: And Again

Disclaimer: This is a blanket disclaimer for the entire story since I know I will forget to add it in some of the stories. This way I don't have to worry about it. Anyway, Yu Yu Hakusho and its characters do not belong to me in any way, shape, or form. I just like to play around with them every once in awhile. Also, the previous fan-fics are not mine as well. Controlling Death's Door and The Demonic Awakening belong to a friend of mine. This story is posted with permission.

**Chapter 1**

**And Again...**

Katrina woke with a start, her eyes snapping open and staring at the white wall next to her bed. Of course, she couldn't quite tell it was white through the darkness enveloping her room. Rolling over, the brunette checked her clock which read 5:49 A.M. She groaned and felt around the box-shaped clock to turn off the alarm that would be going off in eleven minutes anyway. No point in going back to sleep if she would only have to get up as soon as she drifted off.

Sighing, the young woman sat up and swung her legs over to dangle off the side of her bed. The bed frame had come with a built in box-spring, so she ended up having two instead of the normal one because her parents had forgotten that little detail when they bought the new mattresses for her and her sister's beds. Of course, the box-spring in the bed wasn't really all that great anyway. Still, it offered an extra few inches of height to her bed that kept her feet from touching the floor. Katrina didn't really mind that, however, thinking it quite a lot of fun to be able to hop on and off the bed. Plus, she actually rather liked heights to begin with.

The brunette hopped off the bed, staggering a bit until she regained her balance lost thanks to stiff muscles. Stretching, Katrina made her way to the door and turned on her light so she could see before opening the portal and leaving the room for the bathroom. The familiar morning ritual added a sense of normalcy that seemed to have deserted her during the disturbing dream. Shaking her head, she tried to dispel the odd feeling that something just wasn't quite right that followed her for several hours after each dream.

The fact that she actually had the dreams at all worried her because Katrina was not known for having many dreams, let alone the same one over and over again. Usually she would be lucky to remember one or two dreams a year, but they had increased to two or three a month now and they were always the same exact one.

"I must really be going crazy if I'm dreaming about a toddler ruling the afterlife," Katrina told her reflection in the bathroom mirror. It just stared back at her as always. She sighed and left the room, turning the light off as she exited.

"Who's that?" A male voice called from the suddenly brightly lit living room.

"It's me," Katrina called back, answering her father with a slightly annoyed tone. "Who else would it be?"

"Get your sister up for me."

"Fine," the brunette grumbled, taking a detour to her sister's room which was right next to her own. She opened the door and called into the darkness. "Kassie! Get up!"

A mumble answered her, but Katrina ignored it. Instead, she reminded her sister that she was going to go and leave the door open so the cats could get in her room. This woke the younger girl up quickly. She hated their pets getting into her room because they were always so difficult to get back out and sometimes got lost in there. The young woman left the door open and went to the kitchen in search of breakfast.

Kassie soon followed, her face a mask of annoyance. Like every other morning she complained about Katrina's method of awakening her and letting the cats in her room. The older girl replied with her typical response about getting up on her own and proceeded to ignore her sister for the next several minutes as they ate and went back to their rooms to dress. As usual, Katrina simply rummaged around in her pile of clean clothes for a pair of jeans and a t-shirt to wear for her first day of school. She was dressed and ready to leave ten minutes later and sat in the living room waiting for her sister to finish so they could go out to the bus stop.

There was nothing new about the bus ride to school either except both siblings were actually going to the same school this year. It was Katrina's senior year of high school and her sister's freshman year. They would only get to spend one year together at the same school before Katrina left for college. Where that was going to be had yet to be decided and the young woman whose decision it was hadn't bothered to stress about it until she absolutely needed to. Until she was forced to make a decision she just kept telling everyone she was undecided.

About fifteen minutes later the bus had made its rounds and dropped them off at one of the high school's side entrances. Katrina hastily put the book she had been reading away and pushed her way into the crowded aisle with her sister. They disembarked the bus and stepped through the doors of the high school right after Katrina made sure to ask the bus driver where he would be parking that afternoon. As soon as they entered the building Kassie departed for the second floor to find her locker and Katrina searched the hallway they had entered for her own.

She found it quickly and entered the combination. The door swung open on the first try. Katrina allowed herself a wry smile. Of course it had. She'd been going here for three years already and had never had trouble with combination locks anyway, even in middle school. In fact, the brunette could never figure out why other people did have trouble, even as seniors. As if sensing her thoughts a lone crash sounded down the hall, an indicator that someone was having trouble. A senior too, since this was the only hall where seniors had lockers.

Katrina knelt and began unpacking her bag, quickly putting everything in its proper place and double checking her schedule to see what she would need for her first classes and planning when she might be able to make it back to her locker to switch out materials. Footsteps echoed down the hall and stopped next to her. She turned around curiously, wondering who it could be since they were here early and most students had not arrived yet. It was Kassie still carrying her bag and looking annoyed.

"I can't get my stupid locker open," she informed her sister, staring at the open locker Katrina was kneeling in front of.

"Okay. Just let me finish putting all this stuff up and I'll come help you."

Not five minutes later Katrina was standing in front of an open locker in the freshman hallway, her sister staring at her with a mixture of awe and annoyance. The older girl shrugged and stepped back, hanging around until her sister was ready to go back downstairs. Leading the way, the brunette took up a position in the main hall, the traditional meeting spot for her friends. She sat on the floor and leaned her back against the wall, waiting for her friends to show up.

Kassie left a few minutes later, looking for her friends and vacating her spot for Molly, who had just arrived and left for her locker. When Molly returned she sat on the floor next to Katrina, setting her things down in front of her as Katrina had. The brunette smiled in greeting.

"Hi."

"Hi," Molly replied, looking Katrina over critically.

"What?" Katrina stared at her friend in confusion.

"Nothing," Molly insisted and let the subject drop as Kaitlyn arrived and Julie soon after her.

The four of them sat talking, leaving a space open for one of their number who arrived only a few minutes before the bell. She had been chatting with some of her other friends and didn't spend much time with them. No one said anything, but they all felt a little annoyed. Why, they couldn't quite pinpoint, but they felt it nonetheless. All too soon the bell to signal the beginning of classes rang. Everyone stood and made their way to their classes before the late bell rang. Fortunately, Molly's first class was near Katrina's, so they walked together.

They walked in silence, but Katrina could feel Molly's gaze fixed on her. "Seriously, what's up?" The brunette finally asked, stopping and turning to face the other girl.

"You just seem different, that's all," Molly told her, looking away quickly and beginning to walk again.

Katrina followed her and stopped her at the corner before Molly could escape to her classroom. "Different how?"

"I don't know. Just different."

"Molly, that makes no sense," Katrina sounded exasperated. After all, she didn't feel any different.

"It's probably just nothing."

Katrina just gave her friend a look and decided to let the subject drop. There was nothing she could do about it and the bell for class to start was just about to ring. The two friends parted ways and hurried to their classes. Katrina's teacher, a tall, stern woman with blond hair and glasses spent the entire class going over the rules for the school and her classroom, explaining the syllabus to the class, and handing out the art supplies they would need. As a result they did no work in class that day and had no homework.

The rest of the day passed similarly until third period when Katrina met up with Molly again in their AP English class. She sat in the empty desk next to her friend as the teacher seemed to be allowing them to choose their own seats, and looked over to see what the other girl was doing. Molly, it turned out, was drawing. The brunette watched in silent amazement. Her friend had always been an excellent artist and Katrina loved to watch her work. However, this drawing held another attraction for her. The subject looked familiar.

"Molly? Who is that?"

Molly stopped and studied her drawing then looked up at Katrina. "I don't know. I just felt like drawing him. Why?"

"He looks familiar," Katrina explained, wondering how she knew the figure in the drawing was a man. He had a slightly curvy figure, long hair, and wide eyes, but she somehow knew the person was male. She put it off as a familiarity with anime, the style she and her friends favored, and shook her head.

"You're right. He does look familiar," Molly added, snapping Katrina back to her thoughts. "I don't know why though."

Katrina just gave her friend a look and decided to leave their conversation with that. After all, she had no answers except the man seemed vaguely familiar and seemed to fit with Molly somehow. The brunette returned her attention to the front of the class where a short, rotund, elderly woman with white hair strode into the room and began the first day of school ritual she had already experienced twice that morning.

The rest of the day passed without incident and Katrina was hurriedly pulling things from her locker to shove into her messenger-style bag, the same one from last year. All the textbooks stayed, but several folders and her pencil case made their way into the bag along with Katrina's current extracurricular book. There were some papers she had to take home for various classes for her parents to sign and the brunette tried to make sure she had them all.

Finally finished, she zipped the bag closed and stood, slamming the locker door shut in a hurry. Katrina waved to her friends, still at their lockers, and took off toward the door she had entered that morning. She had to find the bus and make sure Kassie was on it before it left.

As she passed through the doors something she couldn't explain made her glance back and up. On the roof stood five figures silhouetted by the sun. One of them waved and she waved back. She didn't recognize them, but one did seem to have long hair and a curvy body. Katrina shook her head and fled onto the bus, a feeling of déjà vu and simple wrongness following her.

Elsewhere in the school three other people experienced the same thing.

A/N: Okay. Thank you first for reading this story. I did promise an explanation for all the italics in the prologue and here it is. In case anyone missed it, the prologue is Katrina's dream which she awakens from in this chapter. And, if you couldn't tell, something weird is going on, but only four of the nine original participants notice it. I'll explain more as the story goes on.


	3. Chapter 2: Not In Kansas

**Chapter 2**

**I Don't Think We're In Kansas Anymore**

The evening passed normally and that feeling of wrongness had long since vanished by the time Katrina once again rolled over in her bed and drifted off to sleep. However, that sense of wrongness returned with a vengeance as soon as the black of unconsciousness claimed her mind. Another dream was beginning, unusual even when adding her sudden increase of dreams to the equation. This one was different, though, which was some comfort, until the dream's contents morphed into a nightmare.

_The scent of vanilla wafted around her, a pale, yellow-ish haze surrounding her. Somehow she knew this was meant to represent the smell. Wondering why the haze glittered and feeling reckless enough to disregard the warning bells going off in her mind, which really sounded more like Klaxons than bells, she took a deep breath, inhaling the scent she loved so much._

_The darkness surrounding her finally drew her gaze, but she felt no reason to be afraid. It was soothing in a way the darkness of night sometimes wasn't. Then the air in front of her began to warp, the yellow glitter of vanilla remaining unmoved. The world suddenly went gray, revealing a familiar head and shoulders. She recognized her reflection, but something was off. This person did not look exactly like she should. The death glare the reflection pinned her with prevented her from discovering what was wrong. Finally, the reflection spoke, its voice like her own, but deeper and with a demonic echo._

"_You will pay for what you have done."_

"_What did I do?" She asked, her voice coming out as a whisper, causing her to swallow and try again, summoning her courage and repeating in a stronger voice. "What did I do?"_

"_That is why you will pay," her reflection answered and vanished in another warping of air, taking the scent of vanilla with her. It wasn't until the vision was gone that she realized what had been off about her reflection. The colors were wrong, like she had once been a character in a manga, but reversed. Black where there should have been white, white where there should have been black._

Katrina woke with a start, sitting straight up in her bed and squinting in the glare of unexpected sunlight. The adrenaline still coursing through her body, but for a suddenly very different reason. She grabbed for her alarm clock and brought it to her face so she could read the time, thinking she was late for school. The numbers read 12:01 a.m. But the position of the sun outside suggested closer to noon when she stood up to check out the window.

Confused, Katrina put down the clock and checked for cars in the driveway. Both the truck and the Impala were still sitting where they had been parked last night. Wondering what was going on, the young woman wandered out of her room and checked for other inhabitants, curious to find out why everyone would be home on a weekday and why they hadn't woken her for school.

The house was empty. Not even the two cats they owned were currently in residence, which was odd because her cat, Ihy, absolutely refused to go outside and would have been under foot begging for attention the second he heard her door open. This more than anything made Katrina worry. This was not normal. It was like she had woken up to a ghost town.

Running back to her room she began digging through her clothes to find something to wear. There may not be people nearby at the moment, but she didn't want to go wandering around the town in her pajamas. As soon as she was dressed Katrina moved back to her door and opened it, having closed it out of habit when she re-entered the room, and stopped in surprise and not a little fear.

The vision from her dream stood there waiting for her. The "death glare" from before firmly fixed on her face. Unlike in the dream, this time Katrina noticed the color of those narrowed eyes, which was the only actual color on the being. The eyes were red, a deep ruby red, but they didn't glow as Katrina had expected demonic eyes would. Somehow they were even more fearsome for their lack.

"Who are you?" Katrina asked, her voice wavering only slightly.

"You're worst nightmare," was her only answer.

Katrina would have cringed at the cliché had the being not attacked in that moment. As it was, she did make notice of the statement as she ducked the blow and ran out the door. She also wondered fleetingly at the use of what appeared to be a katana by her new found enemy before fleeing through the house and out the front door, grabbing conveniently located keys on the doorknob before leaving.

The young woman paused for a moment, fumbling with the keys and trying to find the unlock button so she could figure out which vehicle they belonged to. She finally pressed the correct button and watched as the headlights on the truck flashed once. With a groan Katrina once more sprang into motion and wrenched the driver's side door open, jamming the keys into the ignition and turning them, heaving a sigh of relief when the engine started almost immediately.

Katrina threw the truck into reverse and slammed on the gas, speeding out of the driveway and just managing to avoid the neighbor's fence. A quick glance back at her house told her the strange, black-and-white thing with her face had not followed and appeared to have disappeared altogether. With the vanishing of her opponent, Katrina managed to spare a brief thought for potential police and hoped fervently that they wouldn't pull her over as she still had no driver's license even though she was a senior in high school. Then she wondered what she should do now.

oOoOoOo

Elsewhere, in the normal world, things proceeded more or less as usual. The only difference was the sudden absence of four people who had always been there before, but were now gone, wiped off the face of the planet as if they had never existed. Younger siblings became only children, except in the case of Molly's younger brother and sister who thought they were only two instead of three and Julie's parents who thought they had simply never had a child. No one seemed to notice the wrongness except for one person.

Haru Azuma stared through the window of a purple house in the process of being re-painted green. No one within the residence noticed this odd man scrutinizing their every move, but yet he remained, eyes narrowed in instant suspicion. It was against his orders, but that rarely meant anything when it came to the safety and happiness of his catalyst, the young woman known as Molly.

Molly, who was now strangely missing from the world. A girl who had been very close to her family and friends, but now seemed to have been cleanly erased from living memory. In fact, some of her friends had followed her disappearance. It was a strange occurrence. All four of the missing girls had developed territories, quite strong ones too and difficult to master, but, somehow he didn't think this time was like all the others. He could sense no unusual demonic energy seeking to feed off the superhuman high school girls.

So, that must mean something else was happening. Something they had not yet discovered. As if on cue, he felt his communicator vibrate in his pocket. Pulling it out and flipping the round device that looked rather like a girl's compact open, Haru stared down into the face of a toddler sucking on a pacifier. Really, would Koenma never change? The ruler of Spirit World spoke, frantic and loud as always.

"We have a situation here, Haru! Get your patushka down here on the double! I'll explain everything then."

The screen went dark after that, not giving the newest Spirit Detective a chance to respond, not that he would have, but that was a choice he did not appreciate Koenma taking from him. With a last perplexed look at the happy family through the window Haru turned and strode away. He could be in Spirit World within the hour, and that would have to be good enough for his boss.

oOoOoOo

Katrina rolled to a relatively gentle stop in front of the doors to a disturbingly deserted high school. This was not what was supposed to be happening. It was Tuesday, the second day of school. Cars should be parked in the parking lots and people should be wandering the halls just past the glass doors, but none of that was happening. In fact, as far as she could tell, Katrina was the only one here.

For a brief moment she considered driving over to her friend Molly's house, or Kaitlyn's, hoping somebody might be there, but Katrina felt drawn to this place somehow, as if all her reasons for being in this strange world centered around this one building. Unfortunately, staring at the main entrance from the truck was not conducive to actually learning anything that could help her. That did not mean she particularly wanted to go inside and leave the safety of her borrowed vehicle.

"But I won't learn anything at all if I don't go in," Katrina mumbled to herself. "Maybe I can find something in there that will make all this make sense."

Frowning with determination, Katrina turned off the truck, tucking the keys into her pocket, and climbed slowly out, shutting the door and locking it behind her out of habit. After all, there was no need for some random person to come along and steal it, if there were other people that is.

The young woman took a deep breath, gathering her courage to face the dangers of the unknown. When she wished for an adventure, sudden ghost towns of her entire world was not what she had had in mind. Some sword fighting and magic, a little saving of the world and demonic bad guys, yes. But absolute nothingness? No. What was going on here?

Katrina walked up the short sidewalk and up to the doors, tugging on one experimentally. It swung open easily, too easily in her opinion. The brunette was not stupid. She had seen movies and the read books before. If it seemed too easy it usually meant that a trap was in the works. Nevertheless, Katrina reminded herself that you never achieve a goal by going backward, and stepped forward through the doorway.

Inside the school seemed even more deserted, if that was possible. The air was stale, as though it had been locked up for a long time and she was the first to enter it in many years. Everything she could see looked well-preserved, nothing had been disturbed since yesterday. In fact, she could have sworn only one day had passed since she had seen her school last if not for the alarming amount of dust and stale air.

Roaming the now familiar halls served only to make her skin break out in goosebumps. Katrina rubbed her arms quickly, hoping to scare away the creeped out reaction with the warmth of friction. Her strategy failed, but that was the least of her worries. The brunette had managed to wander far into the back of the school, a place she had been to only once or twice, and the faint, very faint, scent of vanilla reached her nostrils.

A shiver ran down Katrina's back as flashbacks of her dream from this morning sped through her mind. Following the scent, which seemed counterproductive but which Katrina could not help, led her back into familiar territory. The band classroom lay just on the other side of the double doors she was facing. Further down this hall would take her back to the main hallway, main office, and the front entrance where she had come in, but Katrina did not take the path to freedom. Something here called to her and she would be damned if she didn't at least check it out.

Seemingly of its own volition, her hand stretched out, fingers gently brushing the cool metal of the door handle. A sudden noise startled her into jumping back, gaze snapping around to stare in the direction of the exit, where the double doors at the end of the hall had been flung open. There, silhouetted by the afternoon sun gleaming in through the main doors she could not see, stood a rather short, feminine figure.

For a moment Katrina's breath caught in her throat. The nightmare version of herself had tracked her down and would try to kill her again. The vanilla scent had vanished at this figure's entrance, but that meant nothing to the mind of the young woman who found herself thrust headlong and unprepared into full-on fight or flight mode.

For several seconds the two women stared at each other, for Katrina somehow knew the other figure was also female, before the stranger moved into the dim light of the hallway. Katrina gasped, shocked at the appearance of someone familiar. She opened her mouth to call out.

_A/N: Ooh. A cliffhanger. I'm evil I know, but at least I started posting again. Who did Katrina come across in this mad place? I promise the answer will be in the next chapter. *crosses heart*_


End file.
